Leichter, Democratic State Senator, Will Not Seek Re-election

Published: April 21, 1998

ALBANY, April 20—
State Senator Franz S. Leichter, a Democrat who has represented his Manhattan district since 1974, announced today that he would not seek re-election this year.

Mr. Leichter, 67, said that he had had some discussion with the White House about a possible job in the Clinton Administration, but that he did not know whether anything would come of those talks.

''I've certainly let it be known that if there's a position where I could be helpful, I'd be interested,'' he said.

Mr. Leichter, who was born in Austria and is a 1957 graduate of Harvard Law School, was elected to the State Assembly in 1968 and to the Senate six years later. He has been known as something of a maverick in Albany -- one who would as willingly attack Democratic governors as he would Republican ones.

A loud critic of state tax subsidies to businesses, Mr. Leichter has also railed against the state's campaign finance laws, which he considers lax.

As a liberal Democrat in a Republican-controlled Senate, Mr. Leichter said he viewed his job as ''raising issues and making noise.''

He did that frequently with news conferences on the steps of City Hall in Manhattan or in the ornate Senate lobby in Albany, and in debate on the Senate floor.

''Franz Leichter's retirement will deprive the entire Legislature of one of its champion debaters,'' the Senate minority leader, Martin Connor, a Brooklyn Democrat, said. ''For 30 years, his passionate lance was ready for any windmill.''

About a half-dozen Democrats have expressed interest in representing the 30th State Senate District, which includes nearly all of Manhattan's West Side. Among them is Daniel O'Donnell, a former public defender who said today that he intended to seek the Democratic nomination to fill Mr. Leichter's seat.

Mr. O'Donnell is the brother of the entertainer Rosie O'Donnell. Should he win election to the Senate, Mr. O'Donnell would become the first openly gay man in the State Legislature.

Mr. Leichter said that he would stay neutral in any battle among Democrats to succeed him, but added that Mr. O'Donnell should not be dismissed as someone trading on a famous relative's name.

''Everybody refers to him as Rosie's brother, but he's somebody in his own right,'' Mr. Leichter said.

Mr. O'Donnell is president of the Broadway Democratic Club. After seven years as a public defender in Brooklyn, he went into up private law practice in 1994. He said he felt his sister could be particularly helpful in raising the $300,000 he thinks he will need for the race.

''My sister is well informed on my plans and is fully supportive,'' Mr. O'Donnell said. ''She's going to do everything she can to help me.''